


What You Gave Me

by Lucifer_in



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Auror Draco Malfoy, Auror Harry Potter, Auror Partners, Auror Training, Aurors, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Fluff, Comfort, Depression, Drarry, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family, Family Feels, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Forests, Getting Together, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Love, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Post-Hogwarts, References to Depression, Snow, Suicidal Harry, Suicidal Thoughts, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-04
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2019-02-10 15:24:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12914718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucifer_in/pseuds/Lucifer_in
Summary: This Christmas will be as every other. Everyone will be happy, and I will be alone in the end. It’s my only way to see my family again.





	What You Gave Me

**Author's Note:**

> Dear everyone who reads this, I'd like to give a MILD warning beforehand: There will be some thoughts about whether living, under certain circumstances, is worth it at all. But I promise, it does only hurt a little bit and all will be well in the end. If, by any chance, you're like me and usually try (and fail) to avoid ANY (even non-graphic / implied) depiction of depression or suicidal thoughts, by all means, please contact me and I will try and stitch together a version for you that takes the sting out of the whole thing.

_If you feel like suffering (like I did), feel free to stare at_ _[this incredible picture of a snowy forest](https://wallpaperstock.net/snowy-forest-steps-vale-sunny_wallpapers_48900_1920x1200_1.html) and listen to [this breath-taking song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drNVwSgsBms). In combination, these two made me cry while writing *sigh*_

 

 

 

Late, cold sunlight poured through the endless number of trees, illuminating the branches and the miniature snowflakes drifting in the air so that the beautiful alley seemed to be made of crystal. The path had been walked on by someone or several someones, heavy footsteps and traces of wheels clearly visible in the ankle-deep snow. The soft afternoon wind rustled the twigs, tiny invisible somethings shuffled and dug in the bushes and far, far up above, an owl was hooting.

Harry sighed. That and the fact that he was leaning against a broad tree trunk, the back of his head resting against the rough bark, seemed to be taken as an insult by the forest. An average amount of snow fluttered down onto his face, covering his glasses and easily finding its way into his lungs through his nose and mouth. He coughed and spluttered, gasping for something to breathe, other than frozen water.

“Brilliant,” he choked.

“Best day of my life.”

Auror training had brought them out here, into the rather domesticated wild. An unbelievably beautiful, almost fairytale-like forest stretched frostily and secretively around them, unwilling to share its mysteries and treasures with just anybody who dared to trot its paths. But if you knew where, and HOW, to look, and the longer you’d stay, you’d be able to find such dazzling places and corners like the one Harry had just happened to stumble upon.

The other aurors had packed their stuff and were now trudging back the way they had come, back towards the little inn they had intended to use for night quarters. Harry had somehow managed to lose them, fully on purpose, desperately needing to be alone and just breathe. The latter, as he had just experienced, would be denied him as well.

His lungs took their time to decide to be merciful with him and allow him to make use of all the crisp, almost glass-sharp oxygen around him again. He stared blankly at the shadows of the trees, his eyes red and puffy and his nose streaming. He wiped angrily at his face. _Damned coughing. Fucking snowflakes. Merlin-damned eyes._

He just couldn’t shake it off. Because there it was, right in front of him. A tiny boy, running along the path, screaming and giggling and kicking up snow with his small feet again and again, his glasses and clothes still too big, his face red and his unruly hair almost one with his huge fuzzy Gryffindor-coloured scarf. He seemed to be having the time of his life. Behind him, a man and a woman were trying to keep up, visibly lacking the energy the boy, who looked like a small version of them, was putting in his jumping and running and laughing. He fell over, right in front of Harry’s tree.

“Careful, honey! If you hit your head, you’ll end up like Uncle Sirius!”

“I am so going to tell him you said that,” the woman laughed, quickly running the rest of the way and worriedly kneeling next to the boy who seemed rather confused than hurt. Harry could see him clearly now, his huge green eyes the same as his mother’s, his hair like his father’s.

“Please, love, don’t! I thought you liked me alive!”

When he too arrived at the boy’s side, his pleading eyes made the woman laugh again.

“I never knew you were so afraid of a Black, Potter!”

She gently pulled the little boy to his feet again and brushed the snow off his coat and face.

“Are you okay, Harry?”

The boy nodded and smiled. “I think I saw a squirrel, mum!” His voice was an excited whisper.

“That’s rare, dear, those little fellows should be asleep by now.” The man lovingly ruffled tiny Harry’s hair. “I think we should head back now. The sun is fading, it will be starting to get cold soon. Come on, Harry, do you want to ride on my shoulders?”

The boy gave a delighted squeal and jumped at his father, who lifted him up easily.

The little family turned around, the woman’s hand now secured in the man’s, walking back along the glittering and crackling snowy path. From where he stood, Harry could hear the tiny boy’s chatter and the man’s and woman’s laughter for a long time. He mopped at his face again with his sleeve. Whatever must be melting on his head, it didn’t seem prone to stop creating little rivulets that were forcing their wet tracks down his cheeks. A first strangled sob escaped his tight throat, his lungs now burning from something else besides close-to-asphyxiation-by-snow.

Watching the family, his family, leave, broke him again, for the umpteenth time. The way having to leave after each visit of the Mirror of Erised had, the way having to draw back out of Snape’s memories of his father and mother had, the way having to watch so many of his friends die had.

He hated it all. Everybody. Why was anybody even allowed to be happy when there was so much wrong in the world? What had he done that he didn’t deserve to be one of the aurors talking about their families’ plans for Christmas and complaining about how they wanted to throttle certain relatives each Christmas dinner for their obnoxious beliefs and outrageous refusal to support Puddlemere United? Why had fate let Voldemort take his family? And what had he done wrong, as a baby, to have to be punished with surviving? Why not let him die, too, and be with his family?

He slowly slid down along the tree, no longer willing to stand. The snow felt powdery and icy when his hands touched the ground.

When he heard a small noise behind him, he couldn’t have said for how long he had been sitting there. His legs were completely numb, and his clothes sodden with melting snow. His hands didn’t obey him when he tried to raise them to quickly wipe his eyes, again, beneath his glasses. The wand he had been toying with absent-mindedly seemed to be frozen to his fingerless gloves. The shadows of the trees had shifted quite a few inches to the right.

“Would you be so kind to explain to me why you made me come back all the way to pick you up from whatever Salazar-damned path you have been stupid enough to get lost on??”

The voice was angry, annoyed, spitting out each word as if speaking was as big an effort as, apparently, being presumptuous enough to walk around the forest at late afternoon, alone, to find Harry, instead of letting him enjoy the first of so many more memories with his family that were yet to come.

“Potter, I am talking to you, have your ears frozen shut? What are you even doing here, are you crazy to sit down in the snow, you will get pneumonia or frostbites, or pneumonia AND frostbites. Come on, up with you, you dense – Potter?”

The voice was now crouching next to him, belonging to a pair of silver eyes that Harry could see in his peripheral vision widen in confusion, then disbelief, then shock.

“Harry –”

A hand was placed on his icy shoulder that he almost didn’t feel. Freezing might prove an unexpected solution to his problem, Harry thought, his mind all hazy and fogged by the cold. At least, as soon as the cold would take pity on him and put not only his limbs, but also his heart to sleep. He didn’t turn his head. He didn’t move. What for?

“Harry?? Can you hear me? What are you – what is this? Are you okay? Why are you –”

Warm fingers brushed over his wet cheek.

“Merlin, you are ice cold. What were you thinking??”

The voice was now sounding afraid, pained even. Harry heard a few mumbled words, then an odd, unwelcomed warmth spread around him.

“I didn’t notice we had lost you at first because I thought.. I don’t know what I thought. I should have looked for you way earlier. Harry, please, can you say something? Did someone… hex you or something? Was it one of the other aurors? I am going to kill whoever –”

Harry closed his eyes and chuckled inwardly. Draco was another of those curses he was apparently blessed with for life. He just couldn’t leave him alone. Wherever he went throughout his life, Draco would already be there, annoying him with his family’s history, his riches, and his face and demeanour in general. He just couldn’t stop begrudging Harry anything, not even this.

“Malfoy.” His voice sounded far away, low, hoarse, unused, and felt as cold as the rest of him. “I bet you want to be home for Christmas, don’t you? Your mother will be waiting for you. Please, do not mind me here. I will not be missed by anyone.”

“What are you talking about?” Draco’s voice sounded incredulous now, as if he was considering whether Harry might have lost his mind. “Why would you.. here? What are you even doing here? And what is that nonsense about not being m –”

His hand had grabbed Harry’s chin and turned his face around. When their eyes locked, Harry felt a presence come over him, like a tentatively outstretched hand, gently, carefully, trying to dispel the haze around Harry’s thoughts. He didn’t mind. Someone else spooking around his mind wasn’t exactly new to him, and he was far too tired now to even think of raising his mental barricades.

Just when he wanted to give in and let Draco have his way with his thoughts and memories, his eyes closing slowly, he saw Draco’s eyes widen again in.. fear? Understanding? Agony?

“Harry, what.. WHY?”

“Draco, listen. Because I’m tired, and it’s long overdue. Because this Christmas will be as every other. Everyone will be happy, and I will be alone in the end. Because it’s MY choice and my only way to see my family again. Because.. of that. Because –” His eyes had slipped shut by now. He was so close to falling asleep. If he could only distract Draco a little bit longer..

He didn’t even hear the bang of Draco Apparating.

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

 

The air smelled clean and woody. The sun was just rising, ghosting its white winter light over the feet of the trees, touching their tops just so. Fresh snow had covered the footprints on the path overnight, and a few left snowflakes were dancing on the fresh breeze. The only sound Harry could hear was a soft breathing. He smiled. How incredibly peaceful the world seemed. And how perfectly content he felt, looking out over the same alley he had exactly one year ago, feeling nothing but a huge void inside of him then.

A slight shivering next to him pulled him out of his thoughts. He watched silently as Draco slowly gained consciousness, his breaths becoming irregular, his body stirring minutely, his eyelids fluttering. Those gorgeous, almost translucent lashes flickering, the elegant nose twitching, those breath-taking lips parting only a bit. He raised a hand to gently brush away some stray white blond hair from Draco’s forehead. Draco’s fingers shot up, only ever so lightly encircling his wrist.

“Will you close the fucking tent flap, Potter, or so help me. I am freezing. All of my fabulous warming charms, and for nothing.” He groaned, eyes still closed.

But Harry just laughed, leaning forward quickly, using the grip of Draco’s hand on his wrist to pin him down gently with his own arm, and touched his lips softly to Draco’s mouth.

“Shut up, Malfoy, will you. You are ruining the Christmas magic with your whining.”

Draco’s lips were warm and pliant under his, Draco’s fingers letting go of Harry’s wrist and tentatively braiding themselves into Harry’s.

“What Christmas magic, Harry, we are in some Merlin-damned forest in a fucking tent with a temperature of get-me-the-fuck-out-of-here. How Christmas-y can one feel here, huh?” His eyes were still half-closed, his gaze hazy and so fond, and the way he said those words.. sweetly and quietly and conveying a whole lot more than just that, a whole world promised. It made Harry grin and smile and blush and his breath hitch and his heart race wildly and his eyes crinkle softly and his fingers twitch in Draco’s and his body feel so warm and his whole being so full, all at the same time.

This, here, had actually been Draco’s idea. A fucking, bloody freezing tent. Draco was bearing with sleeping in a tent, on an air mattress, by his own choice, just for Harry. Hell must have frozen over. Huh, frozen. Funny.

Without lowering his wand, he kissed Draco again, this time longer and a little bit more insistent. He needed the tent flap to stay open to burn the view over the snowy path into his memory, this time not featuring an imaginary family, but his real one.

“You are my Christmas miracle, you git, so forgive me when I feel as Christmas-y as one of Santa’s house elves on Christmas Eve. Please, do make an effort and have a look outside, the forest is as beautiful as ever. Or maybe even more beautiful today, because you’re in it.” He smiled when Draco’s eyes opened widely, staring at him with a mixture of are-you-fucking-kidding-me-what-about-the-fucking-forest and silent, breathless, loving adoration at Harry’s words. Without another word, he carefully turned beneath Harry’s arm, gently lifting it to keep their fingers entwined, and looked outside.

“The forest has always been this beautiful,” he whispered, almost shyly, and leaned into Harry’s warm body. “You just didn’t see it..”

“Yes,” Harry breathed, his mind and heart blown away by the incredible snowy picture in front of them, and the heavenly feeling of Draco so close to him, with him, his. “And I’m so sorry. And so glad you helped me understand.” He softly kissed the white blond hair on top of Draco’s head. “Thank you.”

“What for,” Draco smiled against Harry’s cheek, dreamily half-gazing out into the snow, half-watching the slow, gentle play of their fingers. “I haven’t even given you your Christmas present yet.”

“You have no idea, Draco,” Harry whispered and hid his smile in Draco’s hair, “what you already gave me.”


End file.
